Abraham Ortelius Africae Tabula Nova This is a beautiful, rare example of a landmark map of Africa

This is a beautiful, rare example of a landmark map of Africa that appeared in the first Atlas: Theatrum Orbis Terrarum. It was the cartographic creation of Abraham Ortelius, who produced the most expensive book published to 1570 - and it was very popular. The map of Africa was printed from one copper plate, engraved by Frans Hogenberg, from 1570 until 1641. This particular example of the map is rare: only 325 copies of the 1570 map were published in the same year: and this map was one of the second hundred to be printed (see Betz p.124: verso text is page 4, "last line centred like six lines above it; diamond shaped full stop after title"; thus 1570 B, Van der Krogt 31:001).

  The map is a significant advance on Münster’s map of the continent.  Ortelius acknowledged his sources in Catalogus Auctorum: he had been able to draw on information from the Portuguese, other European travellers and from Arabs. However the geography was based largely on Gastaldi’s 1564 wall map. Ortelius’s map has fewer decorative elements but those he does include  are stunningly beautiful: three sea monsters (plus the ghost monster, which cannot be seen in 1603 off the coast of today's Yemen) - it faded away in the mid 1580s; and a raging sea battle at bottom right.   The Cape of Good Hope is more pointed that in contemporary maps. However the E- W and N-S distance are much more accurate. Ortelius did not have the Niger as a tributary of the Nile, this differing from Mercator. He also omitted the Mountains of the Moon which were a typical feature of map of the 16th and 16th centuries. He uses Zanzibar in SW Africa to denote a people and Zenzibar as the toponym for the island off the East coast.

References: 

Marcel van den Broecke at http://www.orteliusmaps.com/book/ort8.html  

Richard Betz, The Mapping of Africa, 2007, #12, pp. 118 - 125 

Tooley's Collectors' Guide to Maps of the African Continent, 1969,p. 88; 

Norwich's Maps of Africa, 1997, #10JB Vrients Antwerp Fine